1. Field of Invention
This invention relates to tool held cutting blades, awl type picking devices, and round blunt ended styluses, and particularly to those intended for use within the graphic arts trade, and especially to those which have a plurality of functions including cutting, picking, and holding graphic arts materials, and also especially those which include a slight rotational twist of a user's hand held blade holding tool for quickly changing between functions.
2. Description of Prior Art
Previous knife blades made for fine detailed hand cutting within the graphic arts trade were made with a very long and sharp point. Most blades are formed with a triangular shaped end, and with a cutting edge extending completely to a very end of a blade's apex end point tip. A long and tapered point of previous blade versions can pierce a user's skin with an ability to easily penetrate up to the full depth of a blade's long length.
A process of removing unwanted vinyl from its carrier backing is normally described as weeding. A standard picking awl which is used to pick up and pull out unwanted areas within vinyl cut adhesives can also easily penetrate a user's body up to the full depth of its shaft. A picking awl with a curved hook near its end point is safer in use, but slower in production. After cutting around an area of vinyl lettering to be removed, a user must lay down a cutting knife, find and pick up the curved end point awl, and then orient its point for picking out unwanted material. When finished with an area of material weeding, a user once again finds a cutting knife, picks it up, and orients its blade for cutting, or as in this purpose, slitting the vinyl material. In a busy shop, this process is repeated from several hundred and up to several thousand times a day with a chance each time of accidentally grabbing the wrong pointed end in the wrong way for a stabbing surprise.
A blunt and round ended hand held stylus is normally used for retaining small wanted areas of vinyl to its carrier sheet while weeding away the background, and also to prevent damage or piercing of these same wanted areas. One tool or tool-held blade which could cut or slit and or pick up and or retain different parts of a vinyl material while remaining in a user's hand in a safe and vinyl protecting way, was not found. None were found which enabled a switching from one mode to another with a slight rotational twist of a blade's holding tool within a user's hand.
Today's work environment of home based vinyl shops endanger small children and their visitors by exposing them to these dangerous cutting blades and picking styluses. The workplace location has rapidly changed from commercial storefronts to home based operations, and yet the working tools for this industry have not yet changed to meet more stringent and needed safety requirements.
Some tool holders do have various shaped cutting blades or picks which are compactly retained within their body; yet require unscrewing the tool holder itself, then unscrewing whichever tool is in use, and then screwing in a wanted tool cutting blade, or picker, or blunt end stylus. Many variations of tool blades and holders and clever ways of storing the tools within their holders soon lose their appeal when in an actual fast pace work situation. In the particular job of weeding vinyl material, and especially in today's new home work environment, speed and safety are crucial. Today's fast pace workplace requires much more speed and safety as a user switches from cutting blades to hold-down styluses to picks; and certainly much more speed and safety than what was previously provided by any prior art.